92. White Flowers [1935]

Flowers penetrated Gheorghe Pătrașcu's creation from the beginning, whether they are carnations, tulips, or marshmallows, the small fragments of nature often take the central plan of the canvas and become an undeniable lesson of plastic virtuosity that the artist insisted on repeating so many times. The realism flowing from his works is closely related to the studies in the field of natural sciences that the artist has undertaken. The influence of the great universal masters on Petrașcu's work is recorded by the criticism of the time in an article dedicated to the retrospective exhibition "G. Petrașcu" from 1972. The succulent and radiant paste reveals Monticelli to us, and the structures made in the Cubist key indicate Cezanne. Admirable in the position of the drawer, like Luchian, Petrovich works directly from color, giving the pictorial matter a particular consistency, a mark of his personal style. The artist will insist on the familiar universe and will often include it in his canvases. His brush has repeatedly followed the contour of the apple, the cooking vessel, or the book. In his static natures, Petrovich becomes a master of chiaroscuro through the rediscovery of light incorporated into matter. The artist's execution force is revealed in the color touched by the knife tip, in the vibrant color of the petals, and in the shine of the vase that contains the flowers. The fluid aspect of the forms represented is often crowned by the use of black. The artist has given extraordinary expressiveness to this shade, which he has almost scenographically adapted, in an attempt to include in his canvases the atmosphere from his workshop, decorated with shades of black, white, and reddish accents.

References

OPRESCU, George, "Gheorghe Petrașcu", Ed. Meridiane, Bucharest, 1963. DRĂGUȚ, Vasile, "Reencounter with Petrașcu's painting", in Museum's Magazine, no. 2, 1973, pp. 116-120.

Dimensions

width 47 cm, height 38.5 cm

Description

oil on plywood, Signed and located at the bottom right, in blue, "G. Petrașcu, Tghiol"

Dating

1935

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